


Constant Presence

by SomeoneOnThisWorld



Series: In a Heartbeat [1]
Category: What We Do in the Shadows (TV)
Genre: (angst is just there if you squint tho nothing serious), Fluff, Fluff and Angst, M/M, Mutual Pining, Nosebleed, Pining, blood mention
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-14
Updated: 2020-05-14
Packaged: 2021-03-03 04:00:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,519
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24188527
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SomeoneOnThisWorld/pseuds/SomeoneOnThisWorld
Summary: One of the vampire assassins hits Guillermo and makes his nose bleed. Nandor obviously walks in at the worst time, which results in the beginning of a conversation neither is really prepared to have yet.
Relationships: Guillermo/Nandor the Relentless (What We Do in the Shadows TV)
Series: In a Heartbeat [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1789039
Comments: 26
Kudos: 395





	Constant Presence

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: Nandor might be a bit OOC in this one. Idk, I tried, this is my first WWDITS fic after all, I have to practice a bit more xP

Guillermo didn't notice the blood on his lips until after the vampire assassin hit the floor.

He groaned and wiped his sleeve under his nose, creating an ugly smear of red on the brown cashmere. Shit. The Council's vampires had been putting up a lot more of a fight recently. He should have been more careful.

Stuffing the dead vampire into a closet and locking him in – "I'll get him at sunrise," he explained to the camera crew. "The easiest way to dispose of them is to throw them out in the morning and crush their ashes" –, he walked down the hall into the closest bathroom to inspect the damage. The blood hadn't stopped, the elbow he'd gotten to his face must have been more severe than it had seemed at the time. At least nothing was broken.

"I need to clean up before vampires return from their hunt," he mumbled to the cameraman. "I've never really bled before any of them before. I don't know how they would react to the smell of my-"

"Guillermo! Where are you?" Guillermo froze, his shoulders rigid at the sound of his master's voice. It was getting closer by the second. "You were supposed to wait at the door, this new coat is such a pain to take of- oh."

Nandor the Relentless came to a hard stop at the bathroom's entrance and, for the very first time, he seemed to be at a loss for words. The camera panned to him, frozen in the hallway, staring widely at his familiar. Something wild and instinctive flashed in his eyes, as well as something completely unrecognizable; if Guillermo hadn't known better, he would almost call it fear.

"What is this?" he shrieked suddenly, his voice prompting his body to move as well. He jumped backward, so far that he nearly hit the opposite wall. "You're-"

"I'm sorry, master," Guillermo said, hurriedly grabbing the nearest towel and pressed it to his nostrils. "It just ... it just happened, I'll take care of it."

Nandor's breathing was labored, his face tensed up in the strangest mixture of emotions. Guillermo trembled as well, the ever-growing awareness that he was bleeding in the presence of a vampire filling him with a surprising amount of dread. Despite his constant yearning to become a vampire, he had never imagined a possibility of simply becoming yet another prey. Nandor's eyes looked hungry above all else, searching for any visible trace of blood, on the towel, his clothes, his face.

"I cannot be here right now," he finally hissed, still wild, still afraid, still hungry, and stormed off down the hall, turning into a bat halfway through. Guillermo stared after him, still frozen in place for another few moments before finally dropping the towel and exhaling the breath he had been holding. Cleaning himself up quickly, he sneaked downstairs to his room to change his clothes as well. With no other vampires in sight, he headed up to his master's bedroom, dragging his feet behind him. Had he had the option, he would wait with the confrontation until the next evening, still shivering slightly at the memory of the look on Nandor's face. The expression on his face had been truly indescribable, a mixture of emotions Guillermo couldn't remember seeing on his face. It made him nervous, to say the least, for he had no idea what the aftermath of their earlier encounter would bring.

Nandor was waiting for him, rushing from one end of his chambers to another with restless fury. When vampires paced the floors, they normally did so gracefully, almost gliding in a way that one could never be certain if their feet were even touching the ground. That wasn't the case at that moment, as Nandor the Relentless stomped the floors with the fire of a dozen warriors, nearly making the entire house shake in time with his agitation. When Guillermo knocked on the door and entered cautiously, he finally stopped and glared at him, something inexplicably wild still present on his face, as well as a hint of fear, which had been hidden behind a thick veil of anger.

"What the hell do you think you are doing, bleeding all over the place like that!" he bellowed, taking an angry stride toward his familiar, only to catch himself a second later and taking an unsure step back. Almost like he was afraid to come closer to Guillermo. "You can't do that in a house full of vampires!"

"I'm sorry master."

"You should be glad that I have eaten right before coming home, otherwise I could eat you on the spot!" Nandor complained further. "If Lazslo and Nadja found you before me, they might not even hold back!"

"I know, master. I'm sorry."

"Do you know how hard it is to find a good familiar? I don't even know if I could replace you if you were dead!" Well. That was ... different. Guillermo bowed his head in an attempt to hide his smile, his heart feeling like bursting. It was definitely nice to know that Nandor considered him ar least somewhat irreplaceable.

"Do not mock me when I am angry with you, Guillermo!"

"I'm sorry, master," he repeated himself yet again, schooling his face into a more neutral expression. "I hit my nose on a closet door. It got stuck and I tried to pull it open by force."

"Well, be more careful next time!"

"I will."

Nandor let out a sharp breath, finally calming down a little. He paced the floor some more, gentler with his steps this time, then turned to look at Guillermo again.

"I apologize for yelling," he finally said in a softer tone, his eyes sincere. "You just ... unnerved me, back there."

Guillermo nodded, shifting his weight from one leg to another awkwardly.

"Should I prepare you for your slumber, master?"

"Yes, yes. Just ..." Nandor trailed off, making Guillermo stop in his tracks on his way to him. "I hope I didn't frighten you. Back there."

"You didn't," Guillermo reassured him with a smile. "I suppose I was just a little unnerved as well. I've never bled in front of you before."

Nandor nodded silently and Guillermo finally came closer, reaching up to untie his cape. Nandor silently watched him take it off and put it back in the closet, then fish out his sleep attire. He helped Nandor take off his bloody clothes, leaving them on a pile on the floor, waiting to be taken into the laundry. It was only a little funny, knowing that Guillermo would wash his bloody clothes along with Nandor's. Almost as if they were both vampires. Not that he thought it appropriate to make jokes about it out loud.

"You know, I can hear your heartbeat," Nandor said suddenly, breaking the silence that had fallen upon them. Guillermo looked up at him, puzzled in the middle of putting Nandor's sleep shirt over his shoulders. The vampire shrugged it on himself and took a somewhat bashful step back and began buttoning it up. Whether he did that for the sole purpose of busying his hands or because he didn't want Guillermo to touch him, no one could be sure. "And the flow of your blood through your veins. It's ... a constant presence."

"Oh. Yes, I supposed you might," Guillermo said, feeling rather confused and bashful himself. He glanced directly into the camera situated behind Nandor, all too aware that this conversation might be all too intimate to be captured on record. Nandor didn't seem to mind, though, so perhaps he was reading too much into it.

"I hear everything," Nandor said, looking at Guillermo with another unrecognizable expression. It looked like something haunted, almost desperate. "Every time it speeds up, every skip of a beat. I hear it all."

Guillermo didn't know how to answer. He didn't even know whether he should answer.

"Sometimes I wonder what you would taste like, as ashamed I am to admit it," Nandor chuckles slightly, looking back down at his buttoning hands; a gesture that emphasized his shame. "You smell so good, all the time. And I suppose I will find out once I turn you into ... well, you know. I suppose I will get to taste you then."

Another pause in his speech. Perhaps he was, just as his familiar, all too aware of the fact that he had clearly declared his intentions to make Guillermo a vampire for the very first time in over ten years. He finished buttoning up the shirt and dropped his hands to his sides almost awkwardly.

"It was so hard to hold back," he said, his voice lower than ever as he related back to just a couple of minutes ago. He turned away from Guillermo as if the gesture would help him hide his feelings as he was speaking them. "I don't want to lose your heartbeat yet, Guillermo. Please, don't bleed around me again."

"I won't," Guillermo said as his feet, on their own accord, closed the distance between them and put a hand on Nandor's upper arm to unnecessarily notify him of his proximity. Nandor looked down at it, then surprised Guillermo by covering his hand with his cold, pale one. The corners of his mouth twitched into a rueful smile.

"There it is," he said. "A skip of your heartbeat."

Guillermo blushed furiously, tempted to pull his hand away in embarrassment. Did Nandor know that he was the cause of every skip of his heartbeat? Did he enjoy the power it gave him? Guillermo could not read the meaning behind his master's words if he tried.

Nandor turned to look at him again, stepping deeper into Guillermo's personal space. His hand was still holding Guillermo's and his eyes, boring into Guillermo's, still carried a heavy haunted sadness.

"I hope you will stop being afraid of me. One of these days," he said. "I'm sure our earlier encounter did nothing to help with that, but still. I long for the day when your heart beats steady in my presence."

That, finally, made Guillermo break into laughter. Afraid? He truly was a servant to the silliest vampire in existence.

"Oh, Nandor," he chuckled, calling him by his name and patting his free hand against his master's chest like it was the most natural thing in the world. Nandor didn't glare, or hiss, or jump away, though. In fact, he seemed more perplexed than ever. "I am definitely not afraid of you."

"You're not?" Guillermo shook his head, biting his lower lip so as to not start laughing again. The poor vampire looked baffled enough as it was.

"Not at all," he said instead, smiling adoringly at Nandor. "I haven't been afraid of you for a very long time."

"Then why ..."

Deciding that both the question and the answer to it were better left unsaid, Guillermo finally moved away from his master, pulling his hand from underneath Nandor's. Nandor followed his every movement with the precision of a hawk and the confusion of a puppy dog. For a second, he looked like he wanted to reach for Guillermo's hand again, pull him back in as if he missed the warmth of their proximity. Instead, however, he cleared his throat uncomfortably and straightened his posture.

"Well, it doesn't matter," he said, the softness from a moment ago gone from his voice. "It's going to be morning soon. I should go to sleep."

Guillermo nodded a little solemnly, deeply aware that whatever moment they'd had was gone forever, just like the handful of every shortest moment his heart had been beating for all these years. He opened Nandor's coffin and offered his master his hand to help him climb into it. Nandor approached him and took it, a pensive look on his face as he regarded Guillermo, like he was a puzzle he could not solve. Guillermo pretended not to see it, although he was secretly reveling at the intrigued attention, and bid Nandor a good night as he reached to close the coffin.

"Wait."

Guillermo paused with one arm on the lid, leaning awkwardly over Nandor's chest, and looked at him. Nandor's eyes, deep and dark, boring into the depth of Guillermo's soul, and his touch gentler than one would expect from a hardened warrior or a beast. It all showed to his duality, his powerful, handsome exterior that posed such a distinctive contrast to his lovely interior that was made of nothing but love, love, love. No one could ever stand a chance when met with the chance to love him back just as fiercely as he wanted to love the entire world.

With a renewed flush upon his cheeks, he let go of the lid and straightened back up to create a distance between them.

"Yes, master?" Nandor kept looking at him, a glint in his eyes expressing that he was way too close to solving the puzzle. He grinned as if he was carrying an inside joke in the privacy of his mind and had no interest in sharing it just yet.

"Nothing, Guillermo, nevermind," he said, leaning his head against the fur lining of his coffin and closing his eyes. "Leave me to my slumber now."

"Of course, master," Guillermo smiled down at him. He reached over for the lid and, as he was closing it, he thought he might have seen an eye open to catch one last glimpse of him before the lid closed completely. Smiling slightly, he put a hand to his chest, feeling for his heartbeat as it slowed its pace. He wondered idly if Nandor was still paying attention to it as he left his room. From how far away could he hear it, anyway? Was he able to listen to it only when they were in the same room, or was his beating heart truly a constant presence around the house? He'd have to ask him about it sometime.

"What do you think that means?" someone from the camera crew asked him as they followed Guillermo to the laundry room. Although they were a somewhat constant and looming presence around the house, too, in their own way, Guillermo almost too often forgot they were around for moments like that. "The conversation you just had?"

"Oh, you heard all that?" Guillermo feigned both innocence and ignorance as he loaded Nandor's dirty clothes in the drier, topping his words off with a slight shrug. "I don't think too much of it, really. You know Nandor and his obscure speeches. Who knows what's going through his head half the time."

He smiled as he turned on the washing machine and turned around to the camera.

"This was the first time he explicitly mentioned turning me into a vampire one day, though, so that was nice," he told them. "But I'm definitely not pushing my luck with nosebleeds anymore. Aside from it being a real safety hazard in a house full of vampires, blood is just a nightmare to get out of sweaters. And besides, I see the benefit of staying alive for a little while longer now."

**Author's Note:**

> Idk, this fic kind of ran away from me and ended so differently than I anticipated lmao. I might come back and tweak the ending a lil bit, but since I've been finishing this up instead of sleep, it will do for now.
> 
> Hope you liked it, though!!


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